Meet Mr Mulliner (6 page)
A silence followed his exit. The company
seemed plunged in deep thought. Then somebody rose.
“Well, good night all,” he said.
It seemed to sum up the situation.
3
T
HE
village Choral Society had been giving a performance of Gilbert and
Sullivan’s
Sorcerer
in aid of the Church Organ Fund; and, as we sat in
the window of the Anglers’ Rest, smoking our pipes, the audience came streaming
past us down the little street. Snatches of song floated to our ears, and Mr Mulliner
began to croon in unison.
“Ah me! I was a pa-ale you-oung curate
then I—’” chanted Mr Mulliner in the rather snuffling voice in which the
amateur singer seems to find it necessary to render the old songs.
“Remarkable,” he said, resuming his
natural tones, “how fashions change, even in clergymen. There are very few pale
young curates nowadays.”
“True,” I agreed. “Most of them are beefy
young fellows who rowed for their colleges. I don’t believe I have ever seen a
pale young curate.”
“You never met my nephew Augustine, I
think?”
“Never.”
“The description in the song would have
fitted him perfectly. You will want to hear all about my nephew Augustine.”
At the time of which I am speaking (said Mr
Mulliner) my nephew Augustine was a curate, and very young and extremely pale.
As a boy he had completely outgrown his strength, and I rather think that at
his Theological College some of the wilder spirits must have bullied him; for
when he went to Lower Briskett-in-the-Midden to assist the vicar, the Rev.
Stanley Brandon, in his cure of souls, he was as meek and mild a young man as
you could meet in a day’s journey. He had flaxen hair, weak blue eyes, and the
general demeanour of a saintly but timid codfish. Precisely, in short, the sort
of young curate who seems to have been so common in the ‘eighties, or whenever
it was that Gilbert wrote
The Sorcerer
.
The personality of his immediate superior
did little or nothing to help him to overcome his native diffidence. The Rev.
Stanley Brandon was a huge and sinewy man of violent temper, whose red face and
glittering eyes might well have intimidated the toughest curate. The Rev.
Stanley had been a heavyweight boxer at Cambridge, and I gather from Augustine
that he seemed to be always on the point of introducing into debates on parish
matters the methods which had made him so successful in the roped ring. I
remember Augustine telling me that once, on the occasion when he had ventured
to oppose the other’s views in the matter of decorating the church for the
Harvest Festival, he thought for a moment that the vicar was going to drop him
with a right hook to the chin. It was some quite trivial point that had come
up—a question as to whether the pumpkin would look better in the apse or the
clerestory, if I recollect rightly—but for several seconds it seemed as if
blood was about to be shed.
Such was the Rev. Stanley Brandon. And yet
it was to the daughter of this formidable man that Augustine Mulliner had permitted
himself to lose his heart. Truly, Cupid makes heroes of us all.
Jane was a very nice girl, and just as
fond of Augustine as he was of her. But, as each lacked the nerve to go to the
girl’s father and put him abreast of the position of affairs, they were forced
to meet surreptitiously. This jarred upon Augustine, who, like all the Mulliners,
loved the truth and hated any form of deception. And one evening, as they paced
beside the laurels at the bottom of the vicarage garden, he rebelled.
“My dearest,” said Augustine, “I can no
longer brook this secrecy. I shall go into the house immediately and ask your
father for your hand.”
Jane paled and clung to his arm. She knew
so well that it was not her hand but her father’s foot which he would receive
if he carried out this mad scheme.
“No, no, Augustine! You must not!”
“But, darling, it is the only straightforward
course.”
“But not to-night. I beg of you, not to-night.”
“Why not?”
“Because father is in a very bad temper.
He has just had a letter from the bishop, rebuking him for wearing too many
orphreys on his chasuble, and it has upset him terribly. You see, he and the
bishop were at school together, and father can never forget it. He said at
dinner that if old Boko Bickerton thought he was going to order him about he
would jolly well show him.”
“And the bishop comes here to-morrow for
the Confirmation services!” gasped Augustine.
“Yes. And I’m so afraid they will quarrel.
It’s such a pity father hasn’t some other bishop over him. He always remembers
that he once hit this one in the eye for pouring ink on his collar, and this
lowers his respect for his spiritual authority. So you won’t go in and tell him
to-night, will you?
“I will not,” Augustine assured her with a
slight shiver.
“And you will be sure to put your feet in
hot mustard and water when you get home? The dew has made the grass so wet.”
“I will indeed, dearest.”
“You are not strong, you know.”
“No, I am not strong.”
“You ought to take some really good tonic.”
“Perhaps I ought. Good night, Jane.”
“Good night, Augustine.”
The lovers parted. Jane slipped back into
the vicarage, and Augustine made his way to his cosy rooms in the High Street.
And the first thing he noticed on entering was a parcel on the table, and
beside it a letter.
He opened it listlessly, his thoughts far
away.
“My dear Augustine.”
He turned to the last page and glanced at
the signature. The letter was from his Aunt Angela, the wife of my brother,
Wilfred Mulliner. You may remember that I once told you the story of how these
two came together. If so, you will recall that my brother Wilfred was the
eminent chemical researcher who had invented, among other specifics, such
world-famous preparations as Mulliner’s Raven Gipsy Face-Cream and the Mulliner
Snow of the Mountains Lotion. He and Augustine had never been particularly
intimate, but between Augustine and his aunt there had always existed a warm
friendship.
My dear Augustine (wrote Angela Mulliner),
I have been
thinking so much about you lately, and I cannot forget that, when I saw you
last, you seemed very fragile and deficient in vitamins. I do hope you take
care of yourself.
I have been
feeling for some time that you ought to take a tonic, and by a lucky chance
Wilfred has just invented one which he tells me is the finest thing he has ever
done. It is called Buck-U-Uppo, and acts directly on the red corpuscles. It is
not yet on the market, but I have managed to smuggle a sample bottle from
Wilfred’s laboratory, and I want you to try it at once. I am sure it is just
what you need.
Your affectionate
aunt,
Angela Mulliner.
P.S. — You take a
tablespoonful before going to bed, and another just before breakfast.
Augustine was not an unduly superstitious
young man, but the coincidence of this tonic arriving so soon after Jane had
told him that a tonic was what he needed affected him deeply. It seemed to him
that this thing must have been meant. He shook the bottle, uncorked it, and,
pouring out a liberal table-spoonful, shut his eyes and swallowed it.
The medicine, he was glad to find, was not
unpleasant to the taste. It had a slightly pungent flavour, rather like old
boot-soles beaten up in sherry. Having taken the dose, he read for a while in a
book of theological essays, and then went to bed.
And as his feet slipped between the
sheets, he was annoyed to find that Mrs Wardle, his housekeeper, had once more
forgotten his hot-water bottle.
“Oh, dash!” said Augustine.
He was thoroughly upset. He had told the
woman over and over again that he suffered from cold feet and could not get to
sleep unless the dogs were properly warmed up. He sprang out of bed and went to
the head of the stairs.
“Mrs Wardle!” he cried.
There was no reply.
“Mrs Wardle!” bellowed Augustine in a
voice that rattled the window-panes like a strong nor’-easter. Until to-night
he had always been very much afraid of his housekeeper and had both walked and
talked softly in her presence. But now he was conscious of a strange new
fortitude. His head was singing a little, and he felt equal to a dozen Mrs
Wardles.
Shuffling footsteps made themselves heard.
“Well, what is it now?” asked a querulous
voice.
Augustine snorted.
“I’ll tell you what it is now,” he roared.
“How many times have I told you always to put a hot-water bottle in my bed? You’ve
forgotten it again, you old cloth-head!”
Mrs Wardle peered up, astounded and militant.
“Mr Mulliner, I am not accustomed—”
“Shut up!” thundered Augustine. “What I
want from you is less back-chat and more hot-water bottles. Bring it up at
once, or I leave to-morrow. Let me endeavour to get it into your concrete skull
that you aren’t the only person letting rooms in this village. Any more lip and
I walk straight round the corner, where I’ll be appreciated. Hot-water bottle
ho! And look slippy about it.”
“Yes, Mr Mulliner. Certainly, Mr Mulliner.
In one moment, Mr Mulliner.”
“Action! Action!” boomed Augustine. “Show
some speed. Put a little snap into it.”
“Yes, yes, most decidedly, Mr Mulliner,”
replied the chastened voice from below.
An hour later, as he was dropping off to
sleep, a thought crept into Augustine’s mind. Had he not been a little brusque
with Mrs Wardle? Had there not been in his manner something a shade
abrupt—almost rude? Yes, he decided regretfully, there had. He lit a candle and
reached for the diary which lay on the table at his bedside.
He made an entry.
The meek shall
inherit the earth. Am I sufficiently meek? I wonder. This evening, when
reproaching Mrs Wardle, my worthy housekeeper, for omitting to place a
hot-water bottle in my bed, I spoke quite crossly. The provocation was severe, but
still I was surely to blame for allowing my passions to run riot. Mem: Must
guard agst this.
But when he woke next morning, different feelings
prevailed. He took his ante-breakfast dose of Buck-U-Uppo: and looking at the
entry in the diary, could scarcely believe that it was he who had written it. “Quite
cross?” Of course he had been quite cross. Wouldn’t anybody be quite cross who
was for ever being persecuted by beetle-wits who forgot hot-water bottles?
Erasing the words with one strong dash of
a thick-leaded pencil, he scribbled in the margin a hasty “Mashed potatoes!
Served the old idiot right!” and went down to breakfast.
He felt most amazingly fit. Undoubtedly,
in asserting that this tonic of his acted forcefully upon the red corpuscles,
Ms Uncle Wilfred had been right. Until that moment Augustine had never supposed
that he had any red corpuscles; but now, as he sat waiting for Mrs Wardle to
bring him his fried egg, he could feel them dancing about all over him. They
seemed to be forming rowdy parties and sliding down his spine. His eyes
sparkled, and from sheer joy of living he sang a few bars from the hymn for
those of riper years at sea.
He was still singing when Mrs Wardle
entered with a dish.
“What’s this?” demanded Augustine, eyeing
it dangerously.
“A nice fried egg, sir.”
“And what, pray, do you mean by nice? It
may be an amiable egg. It may be a civil, well-meaning egg. But if you think it
is fit for human consumption, adjust that impression. Go back to your kitchen,
woman; select another; and remember this time that you are a cook, not an
incinerating machine. Between an egg that is fried and an egg that is cremated
there is a wide and substantial difference. This difference, if you wish to
retain me as a lodger in these far too expensive rooms, you will endeavour to
appreciate.”
The glowing sense of well-being with which
Augustine had begun the day did not diminish with the passage of time. It
seemed, indeed, to increase. So full of effervescing energy did the young man
feel that, departing from his usual custom of spending the morning crouched
over the fire, he picked up his hat, stuck it at a rakish angle on his head,
and sallied out for a healthy tramp across the fields.
It was while he was returning, flushed and
rosy, that he observed a sight which is rare in the country districts of
England— the spectacle of a bishop running. It is not often in a place like
Lower Briskett-in-the-Midden that you see a bishop at all; and when you do he
is either riding in a stately car or pacing at a dignified walk. This one was
sprinting like a Derby winner, and Augustine paused to drink in the sight.